One clear message from today’s conference is that Washington, D.C., is the new “it” city for education reform activity. The jealousy in the room is palpable. First, there’s Michelle Rhee (speaking now), who is dynamic, entrepreneurial, and fearless. There’s Adrian Fenty, who is putting every bit of his political capital into turning around the District of Columbia Public Schools. There’s competitive pressure from charter schools, which enroll 30 percent of the city’s students. And there’s even a reform-minded teachers union president, George Parker; Rhee just mentioned his recent Washington Post op-ed. Consider this concluding line:

The old-school paradigm of union rigidity must give way to a new-school approach of working productively with school leaders to improve student achievement.

Ah, watch the reformers from other cities swoon.